


Orfeo

by Macedon



Series: Jeu-Parti [1]
Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Gen, Music, Original Characters - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 1996-05-03
Updated: 1996-05-03
Packaged: 2017-10-09 07:05:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,301
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/84340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Macedon/pseuds/Macedon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Bajor hosts an interstellar music festival, to which a very unusual star singer is invited, Jake must face questions about friendship, manhood and culture, as well as freedoms of belief.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. I

**Author's Note:**

> This story resulted from the intersection of several things at once.
> 
> First, it's the result of two challenges (not from the same person): 1) to write something outside Voyager, and 2) to write a story with a completely _loopy_ basic idea, to see if I could bring it off. I'm afraid the resulting story may be a bit less "loopy" than the challenger had in mind, but it's definitely...er...different.
> 
> The plot itself arose from three more-or-less consecutive events: watching the DS9 episode "The Muse," renting the video "Farinelli," and reading an article entitled, "The Castrati as a Professional Group and a Social Phenomenon, 1550-1850," by John Rosselli. (I recommend the article to serious opera buffs: ACTA MUSICOLOGICA 60 [1988] 148-70.)
> 
> I've always been partial to Jake because he's a writer, and the idea of sacrifice for art is an old one. The phenomenon of castrati is, perhaps, one of the more extreme examples, but setting their beginning in its sixteenth century historical context when Christian asceticism was still admired, it was perhaps less extreme than moderns typically think. Expectations about life are shaped by culture. There are few absolutes. And for all its "loopy" subject, this was an excuse to explore cultural expectations about sexuality and manhood in the best tradition of serious anthro-SF.
> 
> Originally posted at the [Trekiverse](http://trekiverse.org/efiction/viewstory.php?sid=4883) archive.
> 
> DISCLAIMER: Star Trek is the property of Paramount Studios, the following a non-profit work of fanfiction. No resemblance to any individual, living or dead, is intended.

> "You are too profligate with the gifts nature has given you; if you would reach the heart, you must take a more plain and simple road."
> 
> Emperor Charles VI to Farinelli, 1731

 

"The _castrato_."

Jake had heard it whispered all morning all over the station, in tones ranging from pity to disgust, delicate horror to prurient interest. But he had yet to learn just who this castrato was. With a station full of musicians and singers from all over the quadrant, 'who' wasn't immediately evident.

Space stations the size of DS9 made odd communities, blending small-town insularity with port-town flux—material for social science studies yielding dry monographs of technical language accessible only to other specialists. Jake could have summed it up more simply: a torrent of temperamental musicians was unusual enough for comment. A castrato qualified as prime gossip fodder.

Were Nog still around, Jake could have counted on him for the details. But Nog was at the academy, and bothering his father to satisfy curiosity was unwise. He tried Odo, who was making the rounds of the promenade. "Who's this castrato everybody's talking about?"

Odo eyed him. "'Everybody', Mr Sisko? 'Everybody' would seem to be something of an exaggeration. _I_ am not talking about 'this castrato', but would I not count among 'everybody'?"

Jake made a gesture of frustration. "Odo, you know what I mean!"

"I'm afraid I do not. Nor do I think it any of your business until—and unless—the person in question makes his presence known. Or does personal privacy count for nothing?" And Odo stalked off. Testy. But Jake supposed that was what a body got for asking one anomaly about another.

So he wandered about, listening carefully. Among the skills his writing manuals insisted one acquire, the twin arts of listening and watching stood paramount.

He got an earful.

"It is an abomination!" That from Worf. "The sacrifice of one's manhood for art! Klingons do not condone such...mutilation."

Quark's assessment had been more pragmatic: "High cost for high notes, seems to me."

Others, like O'Brien, simply found the topic too uncomfortable. Jake noticed him get up and walk away when his neighbors at the bar in Quark's fell to discussing the matter.

But the most interesting conversation he overheard was between Kira, Dax, and the doctor. Jake had climbed the stairs to the bilevel above, sat nursing a rootbeer while he eavesdropped on discussions immediately beneath.

"I can't believe a civilized society still condones castration," Kira said.

"Maybe it was an operation from medical necessity," Dax replied. "Julian, what do you think?"

"Possible...."

"Oh, yes!" interrupted Kira, "And after, he just _happened_ to go on to become a vocal virtuoso? Seems a little convenient to me."

"Like an attack by wild geese," the doctor said, half laughing.

"An attack by...what?"

"Wild geese. Or pigs. Or a fall from a horse. The usual excuses trotted out in the autumn of the operatic castrati. In its heyday, no one made excuses at all. From the medical histories, it seems to have been a common, fairly safe operation."

"So you think this singer may be a Terran?" Dax asked.

"I have no idea. The practice of castration was common in the histories of many humanoid worlds: for religious reasons, punishment, slavery or—occasionally—art."

"But that's _history_," Kira insisted. "No one still does it."

"Actually yes, some do."

"Like?"

"Well, our friends the Cardassians, for one."

"Figures," Kira muttered. Jake heard her sit up in her chair. "But it's cruel—mutilating little boys just to preserve a voice. It's unnatural!"

"Nerys," Dax said, "by some lights, _I'm_ unnatural, being a joined Trill."

"Symbiosis is normal for Trills. Cutting off boys' balls isn't!"

"Bluntly put," Bashir said with a wince in his voice.

Jake had winced, too.

"But Trill hosts don't _need_ a symbiont to survive," Dax pointed out. "To be a joined Trill is the exception, not the rule. Modern Trill culture has made it an honor, but in our past, some parts of the planet viewed it as 'unnatural'—a punishment, or a burden. There was even a brief phase on the South Continent when joined Trills were hunted down and burned alive."

"Witch hunts," Bashir said.

"Similar," Dax agreed. "But definitions of what's natural andbunnatural are more cultural than we usually like to admit—or even recognize."

Kira sighed. "You're right; I know. But it just feels... barbaric. Something the Cardassians would do. I feel sorry for him. Whoever he is."

And therein lay the rub. Jake had amassed vast and varied opinions about the practice of castration, but no one seemed to know who the castrato actually was. Not even his fellow musicians and singers had met him yet. Jake began to wonder if he existed at all: a rumor with no substance?

Returning to the cabin-suite he shared with his father, Jake tried focusing attention on something marginally productive: his writing. He pondered using a castrato for a character in a story, but shied away from it. 'Write what you know.' And he certainly didn't know about _that_.

"JakeO!"

His father was home; Jake set aside the PADD and rose, wandered out into the main room. "Hey, Dad."

Sisko stood just inside the doorway, hands clasped before him in that way he had: poised to speak but frozen the moment before. Then he dropped his hands to his side and smiled. "There's a special guest who needs an escort. He's your age, more or less, and I wondered if you'd be willing to show him around the station? The two of you might get along."

Jake's internal warning buzzer went off. "One of the musicians?"

"Yes, one of the musicians."

Almost, almost, Jake asked, The castrato?—but checked himself. If his father knew of his interest, he might change his mind. His father had mixed feelings about Jake's occasional obsessions with research. 'Learn about people because they interest you, JakeO...not because you want story ideas.'

"Just let me put back on my shoes—" Jake said now.

They circled around to the visitors' side of the habitation ring, passing a number of musicians going to and fro in the hallway, carrying instrument cases, folders of music, or calling out to one another in various languages from dozens of worlds. Bajor was hosting a month-long music festival—her attempt to be seen by the Federation as more than a charity case. Art had a sacred place in Bajoran society: the Inspiration of the Prophets, and Bajor hoped to become one of the Federation memberworlds known for artistic contributions, along with Betazed, Vulcan, Sivao, Cygnus, and Hamal.

At the very end of the corridor, Jake's father stopped, hesitated and turned. "I asked you to be Salene's escort not just because you're around the same age, but because you're both artists. You'll understand him in a way others wouldn't." Sisko held Jake's eyes a moment. "I know I can trust you for discretion and tolerance."

Meaning his father would expect it, but Jake still felt warmed by the confidence. Sisko hit the buzzer. After a moment, the door opened and he ushered Jake inside.

"Captain Sisko, be welcome," said an unseen speaker. The voice was too pure and fluted to be male, too low to be a woman. It rang like an alto bell.

The castrato.

Jake felt a furtive excitement kick hard in his belly.

Sisko spoke to a shadowed corner behind a slatted-wood partition. "Chi`pah Salene, may I introduce my son, Jake? Jake's a writer."

"Well, I'm trying to be," Jake corrected, shifting posture awkwardly. His father embarrassed him when he introduced him that way. "I don't have anything published yet."

"A writer is one who writes—whether published or not," said the bell voice, and inside the shadow, a figure stirred, stepped forward. Jake found himself eye-to-eye with the dark-robed owner of the voice.

Being eye-to-eye with anyone was, for Jake, an experience in and of itself.

"You're tall!" he said, stupidly.

"It is not an uncommon trait, for a eunuch." The castrato did not smile, but managed somehow to convey a bitter amusement.

Salene was a Vulcan.


	2. II

Jake took Salene on a tour of the promenade, though a certain protectiveness on his part kept them out of Quark's. He was afraid the denizens of the bar would stare. But, in fact, no one stared at Salene at all. When Kira passed them on the walk, she waved distractedly to Jake, smiled a little at Salene—politeness to a stranger—then hurried on as if she'd noticed nothing especially amiss about the Vulcan.

Well, Jake thought, Salene was hardly a circus freak. He was even kind of attractive, in an odd way, and his alto-bell voice struck as different in quality rather than range. Some of the other male singers had more obviously high voices and several looked more effeminate—mostly by choice. Salene's only affectation was his hair. He wore it long, pulled back in a simple ponytail. Even that was not unique. Others among the Vulcan musicians eschewed the classic straight-banged cut. Their version of bohemian rebellion, Jake supposed; Salene's differed simply in degree. It served a second function, too. Pulled back, the severity de-emphasized the roundness of his face, made him look more adult.

And _that_ was his real difference: a subtle, childlike androgyny stemming from softness of feature without the masculine lines that adolescence should have given to jaw and chin: arrested innocence. A stretched child who spoke like a man and sang like an angel.

A sudden horror shivered down Jake's spine, the first he'd felt. Salene, who had been examining knickknacks in a tourist store, looked over. "Are you cold?"

"No," Jake said. "No, I just...somebody walked over my grave." Embarrassed, he shrugged.

Up went an eyebrow. "Is that a human superstition?"

"What? The grave-thing? Yeah. You've never heard it before?"

Salene shook his head and flipped back over the vase he'd been examining, set it down. "Vulcan glass," he said, idly.

"There's a lot of it, in the shops around here. It's popular."

"Glass, silk, raw metals, nanotechnology...these are our main export items."

And what was Jake supposed to say to that? He had never really figured out Vulcans, had already spent more time talking to Salene than to any other Vulcan in his life. Not that Salene talked a lot. In fact, he was kind of shut-mouthed, letting Jake do most of the talking. Now, he stepped away from the shelf. "If you are willing, I wish to view the wormhole."

Vulcans always said 'wish', too, never just 'like.' I'd _like_ to see the wormhole. Suddenly irritated for no particular reason, Jake shrugged. "Yeah, sure. Come on."

In the lift to one of the upper pylons, Salene asked, "What manner of writing do you do?"

"Fiction."

"I had rather supposed that." This was offered dryly.

"Well not all writers are fiction writers," Jake pointed out.

Salene dipped his head. "True. What manner of fiction?"

"Mainstream—character stories. I like writing about people." He opened his mouth then to ask Salene what kind of music he performed, but didn't. It might bring up Salene's castration and, except for the initial remark in his quarters, neither he nor Jake had mentioned it since—as if the topic were taboo.

Instead, Jake added, "Most of what I do is short stuff, though I did finish one novella. I haven't tried a full novel yet."

The lift arrived at the pylon top. They exited and Jake led Salene over to a porthole. "Perhaps you will share one of your stories with me?" Salene asked.

"Sure," Jake replied, at once flattered and confused. What would a singer like Salene want with Jake's intermediate fiction? Only four years Jake's senior, Salene not only had a professional career, but a celebrated one. Jake knew that because his father had said so before leaving them together. Salene himself had said nothing about it: humility or reticence. Jake couldn't decide which.

They stood in silence then, waiting for the wormhole to burst open like the heart of a lily, or the cyclone's abyss. After ten minutes had passed with nothing, Jake said, half-apologetically, "Sometimes it takes a while."

Salene kept his eyes fixed on the space beyond. "I have no where else I am expected to be this evening."

"When do you go down to Bajor?"

"The festival begins the day after tomorrow. I have been given to understand that it corresponds to one of the Bajoran religious holidays. The kai plans to open the performances with a speech and some manner of rite."

Jake snorted softly. "Maybe you could develop a twenty-four hour flu."

Salene seemed confused. "But I have not been exposed to such a contagion. I try to avoid it, lest it harm my voice."

Jake glanced over at him. "It was a _joke_. I meant you ought to think of some way to get out of having to listen to her preach."

"But that would be rude."

"Rudeness or misery—take your pick."

Salene started to reply but at that moment, the wormhole opened. "Look, look!" Jake pointed and for ten seconds, awe joined them beyond differences of race or culture.

"_Extraordinary_," Salene breathed.

"You didn't see it open at all, coming in?"

"No." Salene's attention remained locked on the now-blank patch of space, as if sheer intensity of anticipation could will it to open again. His fascination struck Jake as a bit quaint.

"Don't you travel around a lot?"

Salene finally straightened up. "No. This is the first time I have ever come so far from home."

"Oh. I figured you, like, toured opera or something."

"I have been invited to do so. 'Giulio Cesare' among others. I turned it down."

Jake was baffled. "Why?"

Without warning, Salene erupted into a rain of notes, a capella, startling in both power and absolute purity of pitch. Mouth hanging open, Jake stood stunned by the beauty of what was so obviously a tossed-off display. Then as abruptly as he'd begun, Salene cut off. "'Qual guerriero in campo armato'," he said dryly, "concerto for larynx. Skips of a tenth, repeated notes, syncopation, wild arpeggios—pure show. That is not what my voice is for."

"Was that from the opera you mentioned?"

"'Giulio Cesare'? Most certainly not. Handel had better taste."

Jake laughed a little, leaned back against the wall and crossed his arms. "So what do you sing, then?"

The wormhole flared once more, distracting Salene for a moment; the burst of light paled his dusky complexion. Then he said, "I believe you would refer to it as 'sacred music', though that would be somewhat inaccurate. Nevertheless, it is music for praise...praise of just such as this—" He gestured out the porthole. "The divine which lies at the heart of the universe. That is why I accepted the invitation to this festival in the first place. I wished to see the wormhole."

Surprised, Jake uncrossed his arms and thumbed out the port. "You came all this way just to see that?"

"Just? The universe is full of wonders; a stable wormhole counts among the rarer. There is no 'just' to it." He placed both hands on the railing beneath the window and leaned forward until his nose was inches from the clearsteel. "It wants a song."

"You write songs, too? I thought you were a singer."

Turning his head slightly, Salene gave Jake another of those darkly amused looks. "An accomplished singer is more than a...parrot. Of course I can compose, but composition is like writing, something which—barring the exceptional such as T'Besh or your Mozart—takes years and living experience to do well. I have been performing since I was eighteen. But to compose.... I am not yet old enough to compose well. Even Mozart did not write the 'Requiem' until he was past thirty."

"Is that why you're interested in my writing? Because you want to write, too, but in music?"

This time, Salene actually gave Jake the barest of smiles. "Perceptive."

"I guess it's the composers who get remembered best," Jake said. "Though with sound recordings, performances aren't one-shot deals any more."

Standing, Salene turned at last from the porthole. "But part of the attraction of the performing arts _is_ their fleeting nature: here and then gone. When they are caught, frozen, the life in them dies." He shook his head and looked away. "What point, what creativity, in hearing songs performed exactly the same way every time? That is why people still come to hear a musician play or sing, to see a dancer dance, to see a play told. The hermeneutic between performer and audience gives birth to a joint creation." He waved one long hand. "Freezing that on film or chip kills it. But to write, or paint, or compose...that creates something eternal, something which each new reader or viewer or performer gives life to again and again." He turned back to the porthole as if seduced. "Composition would grant the only posterity I can know."

Jake was quiet a while, pondering what Salene had said, unsure if he agreed with all of it. But he understood Salene's longing. Here stood a man whose hope for children had been stolen from him so that he might sing as few could, yet he wanted most to create something to live on after him. It made Jake think again about the ethics of the whole thing. He'd never considered Vulcans cruel or uncivilized, just obsessed with perfection. But might that not result in something as drastic as castration to preserve a perfect voice?

"Ask the question you want to ask, Jake."

Startled, Jake jumped. "Are you reading my mind?" He'd heard that Vulcans were telepathic.

"That would be impossible; I am not touching you. But humans always have the same questions. I am used to them."

"How old were you when they made you what you are?"

"A castrato? You can say the word. I had the operation when I was sixteen. That is just before the Vulcan male voice usually breaks, allowing as much maturation as possible without spoiling the throat. It also gives time to be certain a candidate has the talent which makes the operation worthwhile."

"Did it...hurt?" The very idea made him cringe.

"I was under anesthesia at the time," Salene replied dryly. "The procedure is hardly torture. Nor do I look different externally. Prostheses were inserted." He was anticipating Jake's questions, answering some Jake wouldn't have dared to ask.

"Who made you actually go through with it? Your parents?"

"No one 'made' me do anything. I applied for permission and had to defend my request before a court—that is the normal process."

Stunned, Jake didn't immediately reply. Salene had _asked_ to be castrated? It boggled the mind. "Normal procedure?" he finally managed. "How many castrati are there?"

"Sixty-two, currently. T'lingShar is no Naples, and the prerequisites are strict: applicants must have at least one older brother proven fertile, so the male line may continue; that brother or another sibling must be willing to provide the applicant with a child to adopt, to care for him in old age. And, of course, applicants must have shown extraordinary vocal promise as a boy soprano or alto."

"And you filled all those."

"Indeed—there was little doubt my application would be approved. My family was extremely supportive."

The way he described it, it sounded like he'd been granted a distinction and Jake was unsure whether to be reassured by that, or appalled. Different culture indeed.

What would you give up, to write?, he asked himself. Once, he had nearly given up his life. Oddly, though, he would find it easier to give up his life than his manhood.

But was that what Salene had surrendered? Did possessing a pair of nuts make a man? To sing, Salene had forfeited fertility and secondary sexual characteristics—and his sex drive. Or Jake supposed he'd forfeited that, having no idea if eunuchs felt sexual desire. But if manhood was more than sex and a beard—

"If you're so proud of being a castrato," Jake asked, "then why've you been holing up in your quarters since you got here, like you were ashamed of it?"

Salene leaned into the wall to study Jake. "Would you say that our interaction tonight has been natural, or awkward?"

"Well, I just met you—"

"Our interaction tonight has been awkward because you have studiously avoided any reference to my castration until I forced you into it: 'politeness' stemming from a misplaced pity. It grows tedious, though I prefer it to its opposite. Nevertheless. On Vulcan, I am a singer who happens to be castrati. Here, I am 'the castrato': an object of gossip and derision. And you ask why I have kept to my rooms? I nearly refused to attend the festival at all—except that I wished to see the wormhole."

Jake could feel blood scald his face and thanked his complexion that Salene couldn't tell. "Sorry," he said now. "I just...can't imagine making the choice you did. Not that I think you're wrong," he added hastily. "I just can't imagine asking to be a castrato. Of course, I can't imagine taking vows as a monk, either. Celibacy isn't something I'd volunteer for." He laughed to take any edge out of it.

Salene didn't appear amused. "Humans," he said, "make certain assumptions, among them the obligation of all to engage in sexual activity, regardless. Other peoples do not see matters quite the same. Step beyond your Terran parochialism, Jake Sisko." And turning, he walked away.


	3. III

Two events the next day made Jake understand Salene's veiled hostility of the night before. Initially, he'd thought that reaction overly sensitive, especially for a Vulcan. Twenty-four hours later, he'd decided that Salene's natural skepticism was more than justified.

A combined choir made up of humanoid voices from many worlds was rehearsing in the little Bajoran chapel on the promenade. They had been there off and on all week, working on Bajoran sacred music. At first, Jake had thought it peculiar for a choir made up largely of non-Bajorans to be singing Bajoran sacred music, but he'd once heard a Betazed chorus do Bach's 'Magnificat', so why not? Good music was good music.

He was walking along the promenade, a copy of one of his stories on the PADD in his hand, trying to screw up courage to take it to Salene. A peace offering for the night before. But he wasn't sure Salene would want to talk to him. The castrato had been pretty angry, for a Vulcan. Jake shouldn't have made that stupid quip about celibacy. No matter how much Salene wanted to sing, Jake imagined that enforced celibacy was galling. Had Salene really known what he was giving up, when he'd made his choice? At sixteen, Jake would think so, but Vulcans matured slower. And Salene had been right—not everybody viewed sex or sexuality the same. Jake's own friend Nog could not talk to a woman as an equal, and Jake had heard about the Klingons: they came out of the bedroom bloody. Vulcans were such cold fish, maybe Salene didn't miss sex at all.

A crowd had gathered to listen outside the chapel. That wasn't unusual. There'd been a crowd every day they had practiced. But today it was huge, clogging up the walkway beyond. Odo stood off to one side, looking disgusted at the disturbance, Worf with him. Jake arrived in time to catch Worf say, "..._revolting_, all of them come to gape at this half-man abomination."

Worf's words shocked Jake; what gave Worf the right to pass judgment on another man's personal choices? But before he could reply, he heard it: crescendoing over the rest like the trumpet of Gabriel, like the magic voice of Orpheus in Hades—Salene. Jake forgot all about Worf. Jake forgot about everything.

Absolute perfect pitch without vibrato, hollow and pure and huge. The sound was _huge_. It went on and on, fell in a cascade of notes, then sailed back up beyond the range of even the best countertenor: first soprano parts delivered with all the power of a grown man's lungs and diaphragm. It was the voice of God calling the world into creation, the primeval dawn, and Jake could not listen hard enough.

It came to an end at last. Jake was shoved into rude waking by the applause and "bravos!," and realized that he stood in the middle of the crowd with no memory of how he'd ended up there—but he added enthusiastic praise to the rest, only slowly realizing that most of the applause was coming from the other chorus members, not the crowd around the arch. Clapping politely, they stared at him as if he'd lost his mind. A few were craning their necks for a better look. "Which one's the eunuch?" "The Vulcan." "The Vulcan?" "Yeah." "He looks pretty normal to me." "I thought so too. You'd never be able to tell he hasn't got all his parts—well, until he opens his mouth." The other laughed.

Crude. It was just...crude. After what they'd heard, how could they talk that way? Were they deaf? Jake pushed through to the front, just to get away from them.

The chorus itself took up most of the space in the chapel but a select crowd sat on benches to one side: Kira and Dax; the doctor, who Jake knew loved classical music; and his father, as the Emissary and station captain both. The choral director was speaking to the choir so Jake took advantage of the lull to slide into the seat beside his father. "God, he's great," Jake whispered. His father flashed him a smile. "I wish I could sing like that."

Sisko eyed him sidewise, whispered back, "I'm glad you can't. I want grandchildren some day."

It was cold water, freezing Jake on the bench. Even his father. Even his father was making jokes about it. Not to be cruel—his father had meant nothing cruel, no judgment against Salene for his choice, unlike Worf. But it was a jest at Salene's expense. Jake couldn't express admiration for Salene's voice without eliciting comment on Salene's condition which made that voice possible. Abruptly, Jake realized that his whole perspective had altered at a fundamental level. Salene had opened his mouth and pierced Jake's heart.

"That wasn't what I meant," Jake said now, softly. "I just meant he's amazing."

"Yes, he is," his father agreed, and turned back to watch. The chorus began another piece. Eyes closed, face stark—transported—Salene sang soprano counterpoint to a Bajoran tenor. Jake could have sat listening forever. They finished up with something not Bajoran at all: the 'Sequentia, Dies irae' from Mozart's REQUIEM. It thundered in the little chapel. Jake could almost feel the walls trembling.

When it ended, the maestro released the choral members. "Be back at eighteen-hundred for another rehearsal," he called. Salene was immediately mobbed by the rest. He bore it patiently, though Jake could see that he was wishing he was somewhere else. Jake's father waited until the crowd thinned a little before going forward to offer his own congratulations. Jake followed, allowing his father to act as a shield in case Salene was still mad at him. But Salene appeared to have dismissed the entire exchange of the night before and greeted both of them with Vulcan politeness.

Relieved Salene was willing to talk to him after all, and fired still by the beauty of it, Jake nearly fell over himself trying to express his appreciation. "I couldn't believe it! It was...just incredible, really incredible. Fantastic. I don't even like choral music—or I didn't think I did—but you blew me away!" Jake had been gesturing wildly, and now hit the doctor in the chin by accident.

"Jake!" Bashir said. "Get a hold of yourself!"

Jake pulled back and hunched his shoulders, dropped his eyes. "Sorry."

"I am pleased that it moved you so," Salene said. And for just a minute, Jake felt that same connection they'd shared last night watching the wormhole explode. He began to understand why Salene might have come lightyears just to witness it. Jake would travel lightyears for a chance to hear the miracle of Salene's voice again.

But he couldn't _say_ that. It would sound sentimental and stupid, especially to a Vulcan.

In any case, Salene's attention had been co-opted by the doctor, who was talking to him about the finer points of something or another musical. It was way over Jake's head. Listening to Salene reply in kind, Jake's own burst of raw enthusiasm sounded even more juvenile. "Just incredible" was no kind of educated response. He glanced down at the PADD in his hand, feeling doubly foolish for even thinking to give his very mediocre writing to someone who sang like Salene did. He turned to go. "Jake—a moment," Salene said, interrupting Bashir to do so. "Is it possible for you to stay a moment?" Jake nodded and Salene turned back to let Bashir finish what he'd been saying.

Baffled, Jake waited. The crowd inside the chapel had dispersed, Jake's father and Kira already gone with them. Only a few people still hung about, chatting. Bashir finally made his goodbyes and joined Dax at the door. They went off together, discussing the performance. Salene turned then. "Thank you for waiting. I thought he would never stop."

Salene's response took Jake by surprise. "Doctor Bashir? But he knows a lot about classical music. I figured you'd like talking to him." He shrugged, suddenly embarrassed again. "I just say stupid stuff like 'it blew me away.' That's real sophisticated critique!"

Salene tilted his head. "Jake—the doctor's comments were merely an attempt to impress, although innocently meant, I think. Yours were sincere. The greatest praise any artist can receive is that instinctive enthusiasm...in whatever idiom it expresses itself."

It seemed a strange view, coming from a Vulcan. Jake would've assumed raw emotionalism offensive to Salene. But an artist was an artist, whatever the race—moved by beauty and wanting to share it. He remembered Salene's awe over the wormhole, grinned. "Me hearing you this morning was a little like you seeing the wormhole last night. Awesome."

Up went Salene's eyebrow. "That is the kindest compliment anyone has paid me in a very long time." He glanced down, noticed the PADD in Jake's hand. "Is that, perchance, one of your stories?"

"Yeah, but—"

Reaching out, Salene plucked it from Jake's fingers. "Come, I wish to read it—and to get something to drink."

Jake thought for a second, then decided. "We could go to Quark's."

"Lead on."

As Jake had suspected would happen, people stared at Salene; but Jake also realized that he had kept Salene out of Quark's yesterday not to protect the castrato from stares—Salene was evidently used to them—but to protect himself from their speculation about why he would choose to hang out with a eunuch. Today, he didn't care what they thought. Salene was his friend. Social disapproval be damned.

Yet for all that disapproval, Jake could never have anticipated the violent depth of religious opposition that was possible.


	4. IV

"This is quite good," Salene said. "Although it is rather... spicy." Holding his head back a little, he sniffed.

"Clears your sinuses," Jake said, grinning.

"Actually, rather the reverse."

"Oh. Sorry. I shouldn't have cooked Creole; you have to sing."

Salene shook his head, forked more rice. His long hands might have seemed unwieldy but for an innate grace that turned them elegant. Weirdly hypnotized, Jake watched him eat. "Actually, vocalists' paranoias about certain foods are based on supersition rather than on reality," he said, oblivious to Jake's attention. "Contrary to popular belief, milk does _not_ spoil the vocal chords before a performance. And my sinuses will clear long before rehearsal." Then he looked up. "What led you to learn to cook? Is it because your father is often busy with station business?"

Caught staring and embarrassed for it, Jake laughed. "Dad's a better chef than me!" He gestured with his fork. "See, it's kind of a tradition that the Sisko men cook. Maybe before you go back to Vulcan, I can get my dad to make dinner for you."

"I would appreciate that."

"And if you're ever in New Orleans, you should visit my grandpa's restaurant. Tell him I said to serve you the Sisko Special—without meat, of course. But don't go there before you have to sing. Talk about stopping up your sinuses! It's really hot."

"I shall keep that in mind."

When they were done, Salene offered to help Jake clean up but Jake refused. "You're the guest." Salene seemed to accept that, wandered over to the living room area and sat down in a chair. Jake hesitated, then asked, "Do you think the conductor would mind if I came tonight to listen?"

"Given the crowd this morning, I doubt it," Salene replied dryly. He started to place his glass on the table beside him, then paused to lift the coaster sitting there and examine it. "Where is this from?"

Jake took the chair across from Salene's. "I don't know; Dad found it somewhere. It's Zulu work. Some of our ancestors were Zulu. That's where I get the height." Jake indicated his legs, stretched out in front of him. "Are your ancestors tall, too?"

"Not particularly. As I said, my height is largely a function of being a eunuch."

"Why?" Jake suddenly wanted to know more about it, and Salene had told him not to mince around. So Jake took him at his word.

"The ends of the long bones do not harden as soon," Salene explained now, patient. "This results in a mild elongation of the entire frame. Despite the fact you and I are very nearly the same height, I believe you would find my arms to be longer than yours, and my chest cavity larger, as well."

"So what you're saying is I couldn't wear your shirts."

Salene frowned. "Why would you wish to?"

Jake laughed. "I've really got to teach you a sense of humor, Salene."

"I would rather you did not."

That just made Jake laugh harder. Salene watched, but without any evident irritation. Jake suspected that—whatever he said—he'd meant to make Jake laugh. Jake was starting to get a feel for how Vulcans operated, and it was nice to have someone his own age to talk to again. Jake had been a little lonely since Nog had left. More, Salene touched a side of him that Nog could never understand. Putting Salene and Nog in the same room together would be like mixing ammonia with bleach: deadly to everyone around.

That sobered Jake, made him feel slightly guilty, as if liking Salene were a betrayal of his friendship with Nog. But could a guy not have two friends? Even two friends who wouldn't necessarily like each other?

"Is something troubling you?" Salene asked. He seemed to possess an uncanny, annoying ability to read Jake's face.

"I was just thinking of my friend Nog. He went to Starfleet Academy not long ago." Jake shrugged.

"You miss him." It was not a question.

"Yeah."

"Did you also wish to attend the Academy?"

"Me? God, no. I mean, I don't dislike Starfleet or anything—my dad's in it, after all—but it's just not for me. How about you? Do you have anybody in your family who's in Starfleet?"

"Only a distant cousin."

"What does your dad do? If that's okay to ask. I know Vulcans are kind of private."

"Not that private, Jake." Salene picked up his water and took a sip, studying Jake over the rim; he seemed amused. Setting down the glass again, he said, "My father is a luthier. One of my brothers sings for various choruses—sometimes we have sung together. The other brother is young yet, but I doubt very much if he will go into music. Like our mother, he appears to lack either interest or real ability. My mother is a poet. Perhaps his gifts will be literary, too. Like yours."

Jake blushed, pleased by the praise. Salene had liked the story which Jake had let him read earlier. "You have a talent with words," Salene had said. "That is something beyond teaching. Although—" he had hesitated, then offered carefully, "I believe this story is lacking something...visceral."

"No heart," Jake had replied, sighing. He had been told that before.

"Perhaps you simply have yet to find a story which you truly want to tell," Salene had suggested, and the use of 'want', rather than his habitual 'wish', had caught Jake's attention.

Now, Jake said, "Well, I'll just have to find a story I want to tell and get it published to justify everybody's confidence in me."

"I have no doubt that you will." Salene stood then, smoothing his robe with a fluid gesture from those long hands. "I must leave for rehearsal. I thank you again for the meal." He gave Jake a reserved little bow. "It was much preferable to replicated fare."

Jake walked him to the door. "I'll clean up here and then come down to listen. Maybe we can go play darts after you're done—if you feel up to it."

"What are 'darts'?"

"It's a game. Down at Quark's."

"Ah. Perhaps. We shall see." And he departed.

Jake washed up the dishes, left dinner in the warmer for when his father came off-duty, then went down to listen to the end of the rehearsal. But by the time he arrived, he feared he might be too late and had missed the whole thing. Choral members milled about on the promenade outside the chapel. As Jake approached, he realized there was something amiss. The singers were talking loudly, indignant, and neither the director nor Salene—nor any Vulcan, in fact—was in evidence. "The bitch kicked Salene out!" said one of the women when Jake asked. "Said he couldn't even set foot inside the chapel!" Then she stormed off before Jake could learn more.

Kira was standing to one side, arms crossed beneath her breasts, looking distraught and angry at once. Surely Kira had not done it...? He walked over to her. "Who kicked Salene out of the chapel?" His voice sounded angrier than he'd meant it to.

Kira sighed. "Kai Winn."

"_What?_ What gives her the right—?"

"She's the kai, Jake." Kira looked up at him. "She's the kai."

"But—_why_?"

"He's a castrato. She says temple law forbids him to set foot in any holy precinct."

"That's stupid!" Jake shouted, not caring for the moment that he was insulting someone else's religion. "What if a guy had an accident? Would he just...not be allowed to worship any more?"

Expression slightly ashamed, Kira looked down at the toes of her boots. "But it wasn't an accident; it was deliberate. Anyone who deliberately mutilates him or herself—'defiling the temple of the body' she called it—is not allowed to enter a precinct. Castration counts as deliberate mutilation." She breathed out heavily. "I've never heard of this law before but I'm sure it's there. Winn wouldn't dare make it up."

"I'm not so sure about that," Jake muttered and turned away, headed for ops.

Gamma shift was on duty when he got there. He went straight to his father's office. "I wouldn't go in, if I were you," one of the officers said without looking up. Jake paused. He'd never before dared to interrupt his father in a conference, but he'd never before had a friend discriminated against unfairly, either. At the door, he took a deep breath before hitting the release and entering.

His father was leaning across the desk, knuckles resting on the top, facing down Winn. Both looked up at Jake. "Jake, not now," Sisko said.

"But Dad—"

"Not now, Jake."

Jake shot a poisoned look at Winn. "You won't get away with this," he said, but stepped back to let the doors shut again, then headed down to the guest quarters where Salene was staying. Two Vulcans, a woman and a man, had set themselves up as an impromptu guard outside. They did not move when Jake approached.

"The chi`pah does not wish to be disturbed," said the man.

'Chi`pah'? It must be some kind of title. Jake wondered what it meant. Before, he'd only dimly perceived Salene's status among the other Vulcans but now it struck him forcefully. "I just want to talk to him," he said. "He's my friend."

"Come back tomorrow," the woman said. "It seems we shall still be here." She spoke wryly.

"You mean if he doesn't go to Bajor, you won't either?"

"_None_ of the chorus will go," the other Vulcan said. "Even the Bajoran members. Chi`pah Salene was specifically invited as the soprano. Either he sings, or none of us will."

"Good," Jake said decisively. Let Winn put that in her pipe and smoke it.

The Vulcans seemed somewhat mollified by his emphatic agreement but still refused to let him in so he took himself back to his room, frustrated at being thwarted twice in a row. His father returned an hour and a half later. The intervening time had cooled Jake's temper enough for him to realize that his father was going to be furious. That knowledge left him weak in the belly. Sisko angry sent the entire station creeping like mice. It wasn't that he was a violent man; one simply did not tweak the panther. Jake wondered now if his parting shot to Winn had been worth it.

When Sisko entered, father and son stared at one another across the expanse of living room, measuring. Finally, Jake dropped his eyes. "I put your dinner in the warmer."

His father ignored the attempted diversion. "Just what did you think you were doing, earlier in my office?"

Embarrassed, Jake dropped down in a chair and crossed his arms defensively. "She made me mad!"

"She made me mad, too. But 'you won't get away with this' sounds like something out of a bad comicslip. I would think that you—the writer—could do better!" He shook his head and walked over to the warmer to retrieve his dinner. "Of course she can 'get away' with it, Jake. She's the kai." He sat down at the table and spread a napkin on his lap. "This was already enough of a diplomatic mess without you butting in, too."

"The choir won't sing if Salene isn't allowed to," Jake said, as if their collective defiance could prop up his own.

"So Maestro Ellis informed me—but that just inclines Winn to dig in her heels. It's certainly not the way to solve the issue."

"_Solve_ it!" Jake exploded to his feet, paced around. "What's to solve? She's _wrong_, Dad. It's just..._wrong_."

Sisko steepled his hands above his plate and studied Jake a long moment. "I'm glad that Winn's attitude bothers you. I'm proud that you're turning into the kind of man who would be bothered by it. But"—he raised a finger—"we have to be careful when we're dealing with someone else's religious beliefs. Tolerance."

"I know." Jake sat down again, hands clasped before him, elbows resting on his knees. "But when do we stop being tolerant and stand up for what's right? Remember what you said about Great Aunt Cassie letting her granddaughter die of diabetes, for pete's sake, because they were Christian Scientists? You said you thought the court had been right to force her to let Jillian receive treatment. That wasn't tolerating her beliefs."

"It was a life-or-death situation, Jake. This isn't."

"Maybe not, but does it have to be? When is enough, enough?"

Sisko sighed. "Your question is a valid one—but difficult. Who made it my place to judge what is ultimately right or wrong?"

"But you're the Emissary! You could do something about it! The people would listen to you."

Shaking his head, Sisko took another bite and swallowed. "You missed the point, Jake. I'm not about to start using my status as Emissary to play God. I'm not a god. Now, if Winn were stirring up a witch-hunt against Salene, or trying to deny his basic civil rights, I'd slap her down so fast, she wouldn't know what hit her. But she's not doing any of those things." Sisko spread his hands. "She simply denied Salene's right to sing in a Temple, based on a point of their religious law. Telling her she can't do that would step beyond Federation jurisdiction. We may think she's wrong, but we can't force her to alter her beliefs. We can only argue our own side and see if it changes her mind." He paused, smiled widely. "Which is precisely what I did." Then he took another bite, chewed and swallowed. "I believe our dear kai wanted to have her mind changed."

"Huh?"

"For once in her life, Winn seems to have done something purely for religious reasons without any political motivation. I believe the shock of hearing that Vulcan's prize soprano was not a woman, but a castrated man launched her into acting before thinking."

"But how did Salene get invited in the first place?"

"An accident of terminology, apparently. Winn didn't decide on each of these invitations personally—she doesn't have the time. It was a collaboration between her office and Shakaar's. The choices were made by flunkies. The name 'Salene' sounds feminine to a Bajoran who doesn't know about Vulcan naming customs, and together with the designation 'soprano' he got filed as a woman. Blanket invitations were sent to each world with a list of names attached. No doubt the Vulcans assumed Bajor knew who they were asking, while the Bajorans assumed they knew what they were getting. Now everyone's surprised and Winn's suffering from foot-in-mouth disease."

Sisko sat back and ran a hand over his bare head. "Some of the doubts surrounding Bajor's Federation application include issues of tolerance. And the Federation member who has expressed those doubts in council most often is Vulcan. Insulting one of their most celebrated sacred singers is not the way to convince them that Bajor is ready to join the Federation. Winn may not be all that eager to have Bajor join, but she also didn't intend to insult the Vulcans. Now she's looking for a way to back down without losing face. I gave her one."

Jake opened his mouth to ask what it was, but the door buzzer interrupted. Sisko rose to answer; Jake beat him to it. "I'll get it. You finish eating."

"First rule of being in command," Sisko said, sitting back down. "Grab food and sleep when you can."

Grinning, Jake opened the door. Salene stood on the other side.


	5. V

Thrown entirely off-balance by Salene's unexpected appearance, Jake blurted, "I tried to see you earlier but they wouldn't let me in!"

"So I was told," Salene said. "My colleagues can be needlessly overprotective." He nodded past Jake's shoulder. "May I enter?"

"Oh—yeah." Jake stepped aside. As he passed, Salene briefly touched Jake's upper arm, a gesture intimate in assumed familiarity. Salene had never touched Jake before, not even accidentally. Vulcans wore personal space like plate armor.

Face carefully neutral, Jake's father had risen. "Chi`pah Salene, what can I do for you?"

Salene nodded to the table with its plate of half-eaten food. "You can finish your meal," he replied. "I did not mean to interrupt. Nor have I come to further complicate matters for you, captain. Rather the reverse, I hope."

Sisko raised an eyebrow, but sat down again. "Can I get you a drink?" Jake asked Salene. He wanted to do something, was frustrated by his impotence in this entire affair.

Salene shook his head, "No, but I thank you." Then he took the chair Jake's father had indicated, opposite Sisko's own at the table. "I have been in contact with First Minister Shakaar," he said without preamble. Both Sisko's eyebrows shot up but he didn't comment, continued to eat instead. Jake sat down in the third chair and folded his arms on the tabletop to listen. "The First Minister has kindly agreed to find a new location for the festival—one that will not involve sacred property. But that could take several days, postponing the festival's opening and requiring all of us to impose on your hospitality somewhat longer. Is that possible? If not, we will need to make other arrangements."

Jake's father had quit eating, fork balanced forgotten in the fingers of his right hand. "Despite Winn, you're still willing to sing on Bajor?"

Salene gave a small, rather un-Vulcan shrug. "If I do not sing, the chorus will not. I owe my colleagues better than that."

"But Winn insulted you!" Jake burst out.

Steepling his long, tan hands, Salene said, "There is no insult given where none is taken. I refuse to let one woman's prejudice, or any illogical pride on my part, be the ruin of this festival."

Jake's father shook his head. "Salene, you amaze me. But it's not going to be necessary to postpone the festival and find a new location. You'll be allowed to sing in the Great Temple after all."

"But the law—" Salene began.

Sisko raised the hand holding the fork. "Upon reconsideration, Winn has wisely decided that this law does not apply to offworlders."

Jake remembered what his father had said about changing Winn's mind. "How'd you convince her, Dad?"

"A little theological argument." His father set down the fork finally, leaned back in his chair, his meal forgotten. "I asked Winn to explain the law. She said that any deliberate physical mutilation insults the Prophets because the body is regarded as a temple. Some Bajorans even use clip-on earrings to avoid piercing the ear. I'm sure you've noticed that."

Jake nodded. Salene simply listened.

"So"—Jake's father spread both hands on the table—"I said that in light of this law, of which I had been previously unaware, I would regretfully have to cancel any future temple appearances. I most certainly did not want to insult the Prophets. Naturally, she wanted to know why I must cancel. I explained that I'm circumcised."

Jake burst out laughing. Salene raised both eyebrows, but still said nothing.

"I'm afraid the good kai didn't know what I meant, at first," Sisko added, still with a straight face.

"You mean you had to _explain_ it to her?" Jake asked. "I'd have loved to see that!"

"She was, admittedly, a bit embarrassed." Sisko finally released his own grin. "It's certainly not the sort of thing that would have occurred to her to ask; Bajorans don't practice it. Given Winn's initial confusion, I'm not sure they can; I don't think Bajoran men possess a foreskin. But it also presented her with a puzzle: the law meant the prophets' own Emissary couldn't enter one of the Prophets' temples. She decided that in choosing me, the Prophets had declared the law null and void—at least for non-Bajorans." He turned to Salene, made a little concessive gesture. "Therefore you'll be permitted to sing in their Great Temple after all. If you're still willing."

"Of course. That is what I came here for. And...a very clever argument."

"I've found that dealing with Winn gives a whole new meaning to the word 'diplomacy'."

Almost, almost Salene smiled.

***

Yet Winn's agreement to let Salene sing did not, Jake discovered, magically end bias against him. Protestors marched outside the Great Temple every night that Salene performed while inside, the curious gathered to gawk and whisper. Despite it all, Salene sang—filling the temple's expanse with the magnificence of that shattering soprano. Some of the mutterers left converted; others' prejudice rendered them deaf to glory.

Jake, who attended all Salene's performances, grew increasingly frustrated with his own impotence. His father had been the one to convince Winn to change her mind, and Salene's graciousness and courage had led him to perform despite insults and opposition and picket lines. What could Jake himself possibly add to that? Yet he desperately wanted to do something; Salene was his friend.

The answer came to him during the last performance. Positively transfigured, Salene stepped into the spotlights and took over the Temple, performing a brilliant coloratura by Hesse, 'Generoso risuegliati o core,' followed by the sweet purity of a Vulcan hymn which—for all its comparative simplicity—was the night's true apotheosis. Indescribable beauty seized Jake and shook him, nearly made him weep in the same way the power of words could wrench his soul.

The power of words.

Jake caught his breath. He might be no politician or diplomat, no station captain or kai. But he was a storyteller. Diplomacy could change the laws, force peoples' compliance. Legislated morality. Stories altered the capacity of the heart, made others see the world from a wider perspective.

***

Jake began writing on the same day he bid farewell to Salene.

It was an awkward goodbye. Vulcans were not given to sentiment and the profound sadness stirred in Jake by Salene's departure bothered him. The Vulcan had, unaccountably, come to mean more to him in a month than some people meant after a year. Perhaps it'd been only loneliness assuaged for a while, or a young man's desire to find a hero. In any case, he didn't know how to express himself and, in a black muddle of misery and angry embarrassment, said, "I bet you'll be glad to get back to your friends in T'lingShar."

"A Vulcan has colleagues and family," Salene answered, unable to quite meet Jake's eyes as he said it, "not friends. Not often."

"Well, you're my friend," Jake blurted, then blushed and looked down at his feet, afraid he might've overstepped unspoken boundaries.

But Salene said only, "I...thank you for that, Jake Sisko. Stay in touch." And turning, he walked through the docking tunnel into the Vulcan transport vessel.

For a month, Jake researched, wrote, and edited feverishly, fired by something he couldn't name, hadn't felt since the unnatural passion stirred in him by Oniya, the vampire muse. But this time it was different. It came from him alone, welled up inside and burst out in an uncontrollable torrent.

Once before, he'd toyed with the idea of using a castrato for a character but had not, knowing it to be toying indeed—born of the same perverse curiosity which had brought the whisperers and rumormongers to hear Salene sing at the temple. Yet Jake no longer watched from the sidelines. He was in the middle of it. To write well, one had to notice everything, it was true. But one also had to live it. Writing was, ultimately, existential. He wanted people to know Salene as he did now—a man, not a freak. He wanted them to hear Salene's story.

At the end of the month, Jake sent off to Salene a final draft of the manuscript on velslip, together with a note:

"You once said that I just needed to find a story I wanted to tell. I've found it—but I won't tell it without your permission. The names and details have been changed to protect the guilty."

 

A few weeks later, it came back with minor musical details corrected and two words at the end: "Sell it."

He did. And thirteen months after that, he read his name in print for the first time beneath the title of a story:

 

> "Orfeo"
> 
> by Jake Sisko


End file.
